DigiDave | The Apple Core
David Cohn nails the essential conflict that roiled the tech blogosphere earlier this week:
• On the one hand [Michael] Arrington and [MG Siegler] are correct in pointing out that the vast majority of technology journalism is lacking.
• On the other hand there is a problem when the only folks that seem to be able to add substance can do so because they are true insiders in every financial sense of the word.
This problem isn’t confined to tech journalism, though it’s a little unusual because most journalists have to leave the industry before they can properly be called sellouts. (I keep trying, but no one takes my calls!)
In very related news, Jason D. O’Grady says Apple blacklists certain journalists who cross the company. With the exception of those at the The Wall Street Journal, O’Grady asserts, journalists need the company more than the company needs them. Apple is far from the only organization that freezes out people it can’t control — sometimes, news organizations are accused of the same thing — but O’Grady says the policy, whether it’s actually a policy or not, ends up harming the company:
My point is that if Apple PR actually read blogs and responded to queries from bloggers things like Address-gate might not explode into giant issues that end up in the Wall Street Journal. Apple could have nipped it in the bud a week sooner by simply replying to my email or voicemail with something to the effect of “yes, we’re aware of the issue and we’re looking into it.”
Plus, it’s not like that approach helped a lot with this story.
